WHY CYCLES ?

Two cycles rule all our lives – the Earth/Sun cycle which sets our night and day and our own life cycle from birth to death. Most other cycles are either determined by our Solar System, the Life systems that inhabit Earth (humans, animals, plants) or the elements that are part of Earth’s solid, liquid and gaseous make-up. Examples of the first are lunar cycles and the seasons. Examples of the second are menstrual cycles, sleep cycles and digestion cycles. Examples of the third are the carbon cycle, the nitrogen cycle, the water cycle and the rock cycle. But what of business and economic cycles and social and cultural cycles ? What of historical cycles ?

Analysts have certainly come up with such cycles but these retrospectively detected patterns have not been widely accepted and certainly have had a low and disputed predictive capability. Historical cycles were last written up by Oswald Spengler (1918), Arnold Toynbee (1934) and Pitirim Sorokin (1937) and are now ignored or dismissed by current historians – principally because of a complete rejection of any ‘overarching theory of history’ but also crucially because they were simply not testable. This site proposes and tests out 10 historical cycles based on the ten outer planetary cycles in our solar system. (These are the slower moving planets whose orbit is most distant from the Sun – note Pluto has been reclassified as a dwarf planet) In most cases they appear to show an extraordinary correlation with major world developments.

WHY RELATE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT TO PLANETARY CYCLES ?

But if there are cycles relating to human development why relate them to outer planetary cycles ? Surely there must be other ‘scientific’ cycles to correlate human development with ? And how could developments on Earth possibly be related to outer planets ? And how would you test out scientifically if there was any correlation (match) ?

Most historians will say that no fixed cycles in human development will ever be found – history may appear to repeat itself but this is all in the eye of the writer or just a short-term coincidence. Scientists are likely to say that if such a correlation could be found it would have to be discovered in the analysis of truly huge amounts of statistical data or be suggested by some yet to be discovered law of physics. Suggest to them that planetary cycles might match human development and instinctively they think that though astronomers (at one time the same thing as astrologers) made such links, this was before the development of modern science and so the correlation today at first sight seems embarrassing for both scientists and historians.

But is it so strange that in the solar system in which we live important markers of mankind’s development should be related to the geometry of the most important points in that universe – in some cases by far the largest entities in the system apart from the Sun itself. What alternatives come to mind ? Would not a parallel match worth investigating be the movement of electrons in an atom – a microcosmic version of the planets orbiting the Sun – or the motion of protons and neutrons in a subatomic particle. But is not a multi billion euro version of that not proceeding as you read this in a 17 mile tunnel nearly 600 feet beneath the Franco-Swiss border – in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

Physicists of course are not using the LHC to investigate any correlation between subatomic particles and human development – but they are looking to unlock the key unsolved issues in physics. But is it any less logical to look at the implications of the inter-relationship between the largest ‘particles’ in our solar system than it is to look at the very smallest – especially as there are few natural cycles observable by Science that take the number of years needed to correlate meaningfully with any major human change. Particles move in nanoseconds – while components of our solar system take years ?

HOW COULD HUMANITY’S DEVELOPMENT BE MIRRORED BY SPATIAL GEOMETRY ?

Mainly through the principles of Synchronicity and Sequentiality (see full definitions in image above). Synchronicity is when two or more events are seen as meaningfully but NOT causally related. When we occasionally notice this we tend to describe it as a coincidence. Sequentiality can be most easily seen in the sequence of seasons and in the stages we experience between birth and death. We know these do not occur out of sequence. Some scientists see potential evidence of synchronicity in quantum theory, chaos theory and fractal geometry but it is unlikely to be ever scientifically proved. BUT CAN IT BE SHOWN TO WORK ?

WHY OUTER PLANETARY CYCLES ?

We already measure the passage of most short term periods by reference to our solar system – the day, the month, the year for instance – but we have so far not chosen to look at longer period measurements. The decade and the century have no scientific basis at all and are not cyclical. The only scientifically measured and monitored longer period cycles are the 10 cycles between the 5 outer planets – Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and the recently reclassified Pluto. Four of the ten cycles last less than 20 years, three last between 30 and 50 years and the remainder last considerably longer.

HOW DO WE – AND MUST WE – MEASURE THE PASSAGE OF TIME ?

Do we not measure the passage of most human developments by astronomy – by the Day (the time taken for the Earth to make one entire rotation), by the Month (the approximate time taken for the Moon to make an entire revolution around the Earth), and by the Year (the time taken for the Earth to make a single revolution around the Sun) ? Of course there is no scientific reason to measure time in months or years – but a moment’s reflection will make you realize that we could not dispense with the Day – because the Day and Night in any location on Earth massively control so many human processes. It is in fact the single most important measure of time we have. But it is short. If we want to use astronomy to mathematically measure cycles in human development only the 5 Outer planets in our solar system have cycles that last more than 2 years. These 5 outer planets make up 10 cycles

NOT A CAUSAL BUT A SYNCHRONOUS CONNECTION

But how could the cycles between the outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto*) possibly be related to human development ? We can all agree that though the Sun’s reach and the Moon’s phases might in certain circumstances affect our behaviour (the Moon does of course help control our tides) none of the 9 planets have any influence whatsoever on us. But could there be any synchronicity between human development and the cycles of the planets – especially the outer planets whose regular cycles to each other all exceed 12 years. (Looking at cycles between the inner planets would make no sense – they repeat every 2 years or so). We first need to explain what Synchronicity means.

Synchronicity is “the simultaneous occurrence of events with no causal connection”. We cannot conceive of how such a link could exist. Though astronomers admit that 96% of the universe consist of dark matter and dark energy about which they know nothing this site does not subscribe to the belief that in future this 96% will furnish any physical explanation of any direct correlation between planetary geometry and human development. For you, the site user, the message is “if when tested these cycles actually work then you may have to do without any sort of causal explanation”. Scientists are slow to acknowledge that there are many repeatable physical processes that work – especially in medicine – though scientists do not quite know why.

The concept of Synchronicity was developed by the famous psychologist Carl Jung to describe a perceived meaningful coincidence. Jung described synchronicity as an “acausal connecting principle” in which events, both large and small, in the external world might align to the experience of the individual – on this site we are looking at something much broader but more defined “in which changes in the basic geometry of the solar system may correlate with major developments in society”.

When we talk of the basic geometry we are talking of major aspects made between planets as they orbit round the Sun – the conjunction of two planets (0 degrees) the quarter stage (90 degrees), the half way stage (180 degrees) when they are opposite each other and the three quarter stage (270 degrees). If you prefer we could talk of twelve o’clock, three o’clock, six o’clock and nine o’clock. It is time to look at the structure and meaning of a cycle.